9 of the strangest things at NYC's museums

You may not know the name Irene Castle today, but if you were alive a century ago, you definitely would have. Along with her husband Vernon, the dancing duo popularized dances like the tango, foxtrop and one-step. This celebrity couple was also known as style icons. 

When Irene cut her hair short—memorialized in this clipping—she made the "Castle Bob" a fashionable choice for women of the time. Think of it like "the Rachel" haircut but for the 1910s. You can see this piece on view as part of the upcoming exhibition Urban Stomp.

Believe it or not, this is just one example of hair in Museum of the City of New York’s collection! The museum also houses locks from notable figures such as Alexander Hamilton and George Washington, among others.

As if this early 1800s watercolor, titled "The Great Red Dragon and the Woman Clothed with the Sun (Rev. 12: 1-4)," wasn't startling enough, it went on to have an even wilder second life. The original artwork, created by artist William Blake, references the Bible and the struggle between good and evil.

Strange things are, well, very much THE thing at The City Reliquary Musuem in Brooklyn. This museum takes an eclectic approach to presenting insight on the greatest city in the world. The permanent collection includes all sorts of quirky ephemera like old postcards, a vintage subway turnstile and seltzer bottles. 

One of our favorite strange items is this tiny glass bottle with a handwritten label reading "N.Y.C. Subway Rail Dust." It's presented in a fancy glass container and perched atop a tiny round doily, all adding to its mysticism and allure.  

The Museum of Sex—a.k.a. MoSex—boasts a permanent collection that ranges from the tastefully erotic to the outlandish. The Siège D’Amour (or Love Chair) falls into that latter category. 

Specially designed in 1890 for the soon-to-be King Edward VII, "the Love Chair enabled the infamous playboy prince to partake in sexual amusement with minimal exertion in numerous ways, including with two ladies at once," the museum explains. Le Chabanais, one of the most extravagant brothels of turn-of-the-century Paris, kept the original chair in a private room for the future king's personal use.

While the exact chair used by "Dirty Bertie" is now owned by Soubrier's great-grandson, the example on view at the Museum of Sex is one of just two replicas based on the original design.

The Museum of Broadway celebrates more than 100 years of theater in New York City with costumes, rare documents, photographs, sketches and immersive tributes to popular musicals.

Among those treasures is the monkey music box from The Phantom of the Opera. This slightly terrifying creature (look at those eyes!) is a papier-mâché musical box in the shape of a barrel organ. A figure of a monkey playing the cymbals perches above. This item, discovered in the vaults of the theater, is still in working order (as it somehow is at the end of Phantom).

An important touchstone to the Phantom's past, the box plays his mother's song, a haunting memory which stirs Christine.

Just like people today, the ancient Egyptians loved to play games. You can actually see one of those games—dating back to around 1814–1805 B.C.—at the Met! 

Find the ancient game of Hounds and Jackals in gallery 111. Notice how board game is shaped like an axe-head or a shield and features a large palm tree on the top surface. Surrounding the tree are 58 holes arranged evenly around the edges. In some of the holes, there are playing pieces with the heads of two different types of canines: hounds and jackals. The board rests on four bulls' legs. There is even a drawer with a bolt to store the playing pieces. 

"Egyptians likened the intricate voyage through the underworld to a game," the museum explained. "This made gaming boards and gaming pieces appropriate objects to deposit in tombs."

What gift do you give a renowned political cartoonist in the mid-1800s? Why, a stoneware jug crawling with snakes, of course. 

The swirling mass of snakes and heads on this jug represents the Boss Tweed ring, a notoriously corrupt group of New York City politicians. The jug was created as a "thank you" gift for Thomas Nast, who used his cartoons to attack Tweed and his henchmen, who controlled the political machine known as Tammany Hall. Tweed is the bearded head without glasses, and most of the other heads represent his associates. The head of Thomas Nast is on the jug neck above the others.

Find it at The New York Historical on the Upper West Side. 

Why is there a space suit inside this museum dedicated to transit on the ground, not outer space? Well, this orange jumpsuit isn't quite what it seems at first glance. 

Instead, it was made for subway scrubbing. These NYCTA Clean Car Team coveralls were worn in the 1980s by crews who worked to erase graffiti from NYC's subway cars. When the Clean Car Program launched in 1984, plenty of people doubted it would make a dent, but by 1988, a whopping 85% of the fleet was graffiti-free.

"While these suits never left Earth’s atmosphere, their wearers were definitely part of a giant leap—for cleaner commutes!" Transit Museum officials tell Time Out. 

See if you can spot it at The Subway Is… exhibit at the New York Transit Museum in Downtown Brooklyn.